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Gym climbing difficult tonight


Sabu

8-Sep-2005
4:40:19 PM

ahaha the schools principles and insures im sure would have hearts attacks if they saw some of the things that have happened. like a 7m fall on a 7.5m wall (many years ago a guy was trying to clip the chains and had pulled in heaps of slack to do it but poped just before he clipped). To lead on the roof we used to have to solo the first 5-6m before the first clip and only occasionally we'd have a matt underneith. but a lot has changed since then.

the fact is if there is even one injury, our club is finished. we (the regular climbers) all know that and do our best to ensure the safety of all. thankfully it's not my job to persude the insurers and principles!! we (the students) keep everyone happy by owning each division we enter for cliffhanger all-schools comp and the good results for states and our coaches/supervisers present those awesome results to the heads of the school then negotiate the extra funding :p!!!
**as a responsible chockstoner i shall withhold the name of the school and only mention it if asked, yes this was a sponsered comment! ;)**


kezza

8-Sep-2005
4:46:01 PM

On 8/09/2005 Sabu wrote:
>the fact is if there is even one injury, our club is finished.

So wouldn't this 'fact' make you more inclined to use back ups and not be lazy when it comes to safety even if it is only 30 seconds? No need to have a "it won't happen to me" attitude.

-Kerryn-


nmonteith

8-Sep-2005
5:09:04 PM

Type "single point climbing accident" into Google and read some sobering stories about people trusting
their life to one piece of gear.


Sabu

8-Sep-2005
5:09:18 PM

ja true good point, im not trying to say we're lazy and don't care!! but we know the gear, i know and fully trust my gear (which i mostly use). it is safe and the (two) coaches wouldn't allow it to happen if it wasn't.
sorry, i should explain that fact more: the possible accidents that we really worry about are ones involving new climbers/belayers, who are young (about year 7 or 8). things such as them not paying attention while belaying, not double backing harnesses etc are wat we watch for. because if one of them gets hurt and a mother who knows very little about climbing takes us on, we'll lose. my parents know the risk and so do the others. if i was to get hurt in a freak accident i know that my parents wouldn't try shut down the club. they know we wouldn't do anything stupid that would endanger other peoples lives.
sabu

patto

8-Sep-2005
5:23:08 PM

On 8/09/2005 nmonteith wrote:
>Anyone there think of two points of safety backup for an anchor? or a
>metal chain instead of a dodgy
>sling???
>

I don't see the problem with only using one sling. We use redundancy in our anchors to ensure that the anchors connection with the wall doesn't fail. Not in case of catastrophic gear failure. Besides many anchor setups go to single focus point often a single screwgate.

In our regular day to day climbing we often rely on single pieces. Abseiling we rely on a single carabinar, we rely on a single harness, we rely on a single rope. These things normally are't rated any higher than a decent 25KN sling.

I would not consider it poor practice to rely on a single 25KN sling for any temporary usage. For any pernament top roping setup though I would expect a solid steel 30+KN setup.


nmonteith

8-Sep-2005
5:32:30 PM

On 8/09/2005 patto wrote:
>I would not consider it poor practice to rely on a single 25KN sling for
>any temporary usage. For any pernament top roping setup though I would
>expect a solid steel 30+KN setup.

This is a school climbing wall we are talking about - i can' think of a worse litigation hot spot anywhere.
Sabu said sling had worn through un-beknowingly to everyone - that doesn't sound very bomber to me!


Sabu

8-Sep-2005
5:41:21 PM

ahh yes but the youngins don't lead or trust the sling, there is only a select few the actually lead and would have used the sling, (we're talking like 2-3 ppl, myself included). i am the only regular leader, the rest only occasionally lead. there is no way in hell i would let one of the young ones lead as if one does not know wat they are doing it could very easily result in something bad.
also the sling wasn't totalled, we put full force on it to try break it and it wouldn't. it probably wasn't as bad as it looked, i'll try describe it: the one side was melted away exposing the second layer of material the other side was still holding strong. having said that i wouldn't have trusted it.


dan

8-Sep-2005
6:35:00 PM

For club, commerical or school climbing I would recomend two dedecated double lines to double (counter-posed) steel carabiners, using figure eights not bunny ears.

Absailing should be performed with a second belay rope, or at the very least a bottom belay.


Sabu

8-Sep-2005
6:52:03 PM

On 8/09/2005 dan wrote:
>For club, commerical or school climbing I would recomend two dedecated
>double lines to double (counter-posed) steel carabiners, using figure eights
>not bunny ears.

as an anchor?? not even cliffhanger use that set up., they have the bars up top of some of the walls, our bar is thicker :P !!!

patto

8-Sep-2005
7:12:32 PM

On 8/09/2005 nmonteith wrote:
>
>This is a school climbing wall we are talking about - i can' think of
>a worse litigation hot spot anywhere.
>Sabu said sling had worn through un-beknowingly to everyone - that doesn't
>sound very bomber to me!

Doesn't sound very bomber to me either. The problem I see is not inspecting the sling for wear. Even a school or a climbing gym would be unsafe if ropes weren't inspected regularily for wear. I agree everything should be super safe with schools but even schools only rely on 1 rope.

I was lucky enough to go on a rock climbing trip with my school. The first multipitch climb I ever did was a trip up The Bard with this group. Whatsmore we even started some lead climbing that long weekend.

It is a pitty that litigation is destroying things like this.


kerroxapithecus

8-Sep-2005
11:03:40 PM

I'm glad you have so much faith nmonteith. I'm probably not that fortunate. Maybe I'm just a doubting Thomas. I appreciate your comments. I only hope you are dead right! of course and no accident resulting from negligence will ever happen in a climbing gym.

I know my scenario seems unlikely but strangely enough unlikely things do happen sometimes and I'm only talking about sometimes because accidents caused by negligence (not specifically climbing accidents) aren't common. I'm just pointing out here that they do happen and they happen to real people who once had legs and don't any more. (no offence of course to anyone without legs or people with any form of disability for that matter, in case some likely-to-be-offended person is watching). And ok maybe my specific examples are bogus but human error can occur in any setting.

btw I don't tie any knots at the gym...have I missed something important?


kezza

8-Sep-2005
11:04:43 PM

Not the size of the bar, it's the way you use it Sabu! ;-) hehe


nmonteith

8-Sep-2005
11:21:09 PM

On 8/09/2005 kerroxapithecus wrote:
>btw I don't tie any knots at the gym...have I missed something important?

Maybe Sydney gyms don't force you to tie in? Our Melbourne gyms make you tie into every climb - then
clip a carbiner in as a secondary backup.

dalai

8-Sep-2005
11:23:43 PM

On 8/09/2005 kerroxapithecus wrote:
>
>btw I don't tie any knots at the gym...have I missed something important?

Just checked your profile, all is clear...

In Melbourne gyms, it's been standard practice to have two knots on the climbers end like Sydney but with one major difference. The first is a doubled figure eight knot to clip into with a screwgate, the other is a rethreaded figure 8 the climber ties themselves after feeding the tail into their harness.

Sydney still relies on the 2 screwgate clip in which is an inferior gym attachment method IMO. The rethread teaches the correct tie in method with a screwgate back up.


kerroxapithecus

8-Sep-2005
11:29:58 PM

Sorry it just gets too techy for me and my head begins to spin. Yes that's what we have. Why is it inferior? Am I going to get too much information again so I freak out again?

dalai

8-Sep-2005
11:37:14 PM

On 8/09/2005 kerroxapithecus wrote:
>Sorry it just gets too techy for me and my head begins to spin. Yes that's
>what we have. Why is it inferior? Am I going to get too much information
>again so I freak out again?

Best at this time to forget I mentioned anything and enjoy your climbing...


kerroxapithecus

8-Sep-2005
11:41:53 PM

yes i think so!

thanx

wyt91t

9-Sep-2005
2:46:18 AM

Dalai whats the go with the tie method ?
I'm from sydney and climb indoors just as much as outdoors.when i tie in there's no crab on my tie in point, it's either a rethreaded bowline with a stopper knot or the basic figure 8 method.thats the one thing that sucks about cliffhanger tie,climb,untie walk away what a pain. Clip,clip climb clip,clip walk away is so much easier. Now about tying knots should you really call yourself a climber if the belayer has to tie in for you. As a climber knots are the first thing that you learn it's like riding a bike you never forget? I work in a gym in sydney and i would hate my job if i had to run around checking that 80 school kids have tied there knots right, and saying how do i untie this when they get back down.? that would drive me crazy, carabiners are easy to spot when left open due to the red coloured screwing nut that ours have.We save alot of time teaching the clip screw method compared to cliffhanger where they have to make sure you can tie knots before climbing.Beginners are more interested in climbing that knots.It's when beginners start leading that they should know there knots and well at that.besides that i'am not complaining about cliffhanger,i love that place when i'am down in vic it's my second home the gym that is.


cheesehead

9-Sep-2005
7:32:55 AM

Adding a screwgate to the second knot is adding another single point of failure.

eg. if you lead on one rope, if you clip that to your harness, the rope or crab could fail. Whereas if you tie in (no crab), there's only the rope that can fail.

It's an almost trivial difference (especially with routine gear checks). It hopefully teaches you to tie figure-8's, and is a redundancy in case you're not savy with either system (which shouldn't be the case)


kezza

9-Sep-2005
8:24:47 AM

I say the reason we clip and tie is as simple as to have two connection points. Also I think the reason we don't just clip and clip at Cliffhanger is because, say you forget to lock one biner, then you will clearly forget to lock the other. Spending that extra time to tie the figure of 8 gives our newbies and even regulars time to recheck there knots and biner. If you are just clip clip climb, clip clip climb.. especially with newbies as they become lazy towards the end of there session and it really will be clip clip climb.. no locking of biners. Also it's a lot easier to spot an undone knot compared to an undone biner as there is a big length of tail trailing behind the climber. Teaching kids to tie knots isn't a waste of time, as an example, if we had a school group of 25 maybe one would have trouble tying there figure of eight, the other 24 kids can give them a hand.. So it's never a whole class asking me how to tie there knot or untie (?), I think you underestimate the learning abilities of newbie climbers.

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